


Blink of an Eye

by matan4il



Category: Historical RPF
Genre: F/F, Habsburgs, Self-Reflection, Undying Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-15
Updated: 2018-01-15
Packaged: 2019-03-05 00:36:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13376397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matan4il/pseuds/matan4il
Summary: Isabella of Parma's moment of passing away from her POV.





	Blink of an Eye

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday, Ivett! <3 Thank you for all you have brought into my life, including a love for the tragic Isabella.

Isabella always knew. Or maybe it was not always, maybe it settled in gradually, in bits and pieces, which served to make it feel as if this certainty was always there. When she lost her young mother. When her wishes were irrelevant in the matter of her own marriage. When she met for the first time the man who was already her husband (a wedding by proxy, what a madman's game) and his eyes were cold. 'Awkward', people told her about him, 'shy and awkward'. Yet to her, they were cold. Perhaps a reflection of the cold demand made of her, to charm the young man. Put to a test she was not allowed to fail. And oh, he came to approve of her without a doubt, probably even came to believe his declarations of love, the fool. For her, his mouth stretched in a smile of proud, pleased ownership and he was willing to show his satisfaction, affection in the terms he used with her, with as many gifts as she would ask of him. She asked for none and he showered her with them regardless. _But his eyes_. And she knew. She had lost all sense of warmth, of the Mediterranean sun that once caressed her locks of hair as she played in the gardens of her youth; she had forgotten what it was like not to subtly shiver underneath four or five layers of royal, stiff clothes in the hallways of Austrian castles. 'How can she be so unhappy,' she heard it whispered more than once in the court, 'when she is so beautiful and bright, so talented and accomplished, when her husband adores her and through him, she has secured the title of Empress?' She heard it whispered in the court or in the shadows of her own mind. It felt like she always knew, she wasn't long for this world.

That's why this moment is no surprise. Here, on her deathbed. The soundless footsteps ringing in her ears, those of the ultimate conqueror, before whom all are vanquished. How long she had hoped for this and now it's here. And it is filled with dread. There's her husband by her side, not at all as Isabella meant it to be. There's her whizzing through the physical anguish. And then, there's a final scream. A last revolt for what her body was made to endure which she did not want and would have never chosen. It's agonized, it shakes her to the very core, but then she lets go. There is no longer any fear, any torment left in her. She's as light as a feather, ready to give flight as she's swept away. From the sun she came and to the sun she shall now return. There's but one remnant of sorrow. She wants, more than anything, to write a letter. Cover one last parchment with a confession. A testimony of an undying love. "It's my body that is about to be no more," she wants to tell _her_ , "not my feelings for you. Never those." The darker the room grows around her, the clearer Isabella can see that beloved face. _Mimi_. 

She can hear her laughter. Clear and unbridled as the morning air. Is her love present? It's hard to tell. It seems as though she is, but Isabella's mind is running away from her. Running down long, majestic corridors that open into further endless halls. Running in search of the outside. And her Mimi will follow. Her poor darling. Sometimes Isabella had thought her cruel. At this moment, she knows Mimi's is the greater burden, the sadder fate. How long will her sweet girl have to wait before they're reunited once more? Her beloved had never been patient. Always full of life and joy bursting out of her, forcing some of her happiness onto Isabella even when the clouds of a foreign country were at their dreariest. Even when the pain of carrying children to a man whose touch she did not desire grew exponentially. Maybe it was not the pregnancy or the birth, but her hurt that time and time again they could not survive. 

But now she feels the peace they found, a calm she has come to share. She can let go of guilt. And Mimi, her vivacious girl, with her love of art and music and garden walks, Maria Christina, who she named an unfortunate daughter after, her one ray of light, will be left to handle the loss all alone. Isabella lets go and wishes happiness on her beloved for the coming years, for they can be long and heavy for those who stay behind. Whatever substitute will come, may they give her comfort, as much as they will only be there because Isabella isn't. She may be leaving this existence, but she's warmly wrapped in the clarity that it would be as a split second in time before she's united once more with her love. With her, whose golden hair carried the memories of distant days. Who could light up every melancholy room in Vienna. Whose eyes Isabella found when she had lost all else, including her home. Eyes that became home. That sent heat through her body and her soul.

It goes unnoticed by all who are present in the room as the young Isabella passes away, that hint of a smile on her lips. _Because her eyes_.


End file.
